


In Re: Ecological Contamination

by jenna_thorn



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-05-25
Updated: 2008-05-25
Packaged: 2017-10-05 10:53:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/41006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenna_thorn/pseuds/jenna_thorn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>As a sort of Companion Piece to <a href="http://beadslut.livejournal.com/244853.html?style=mine">They Also Serve</a>, I present the story that wound up not being about waiting, but still features secondary characters from Stargate Atlantis.</p>
    </blockquote>





	In Re: Ecological Contamination

**Author's Note:**

> As a sort of Companion Piece to [They Also Serve](http://beadslut.livejournal.com/244853.html?style=mine), I present the story that wound up not being about waiting, but still features secondary characters from Stargate Atlantis.

"What the hell are they doing?" Johnson set the laptop he was carrying on the counter and moved to the yellow pane of the window.

"The grunts?" Dinh answered himself, "Pushups, probably. Come over here and help me with this."

"Bad enough that the cafeteria is called the mess, but now they can't be bothered to keep their food waste inside the building?"

"Mike, it's a beautiful day for a picnic; c'mon, this is heavy. Help me lift."

"Sonova_bitch_." Johnson slapped the door open, banging his shoulder against it when it didn't slide quickly enough. Dinh let the console section fall back to the cart and followed, worried. His longer stride let him almost catch up to Johnson on the stairs, so he blinked away the dazzle of the sunshine on the pier in time to see two Marines skipping stones of some sort across the waves and another three engaging in a juvenile contest involving distance and accuracy and their dicks, fitting the stereotyping comments that circulated around staff meetings. He hurried to catch up, calling and waving. The Marines looked at him with casual interest, which is probably the only reason Johnson landed his first punch. The soldier he hit looked surprised and vaguely offended, then locked up Johnson's arm in way that had to be less painful than it looked, because Johnson kept flailing with the other hand, swinging wildly, swearing a blue streak. The soldier pulled Johnson's wrist up sharply and Dinh cried out, "Don't hurt him!" in time to think how inutterably stupid saying that was. Johnson went to his knees with a sharp shout and the soldier carefully put his knee on Johnson's back, forcing him fully down to the path. Dinh took a deep breath, then walked up the last few steps, his hands held away from his sides. The men before him had transformed from youthful hooligans to soldiers with careful hooded eyes as though Johnson was the catalyst in some insane psychological solution.

Dinh glanced at the blood spattered on the path and said, "He's, uh, he's overworked, and I'll just, um…"

The marine kneeling on Johnson's back let go of his arm, and it fell, limp, with a painful sounding slap. The Marine rocked to his feet, "You need any help taking him to the infirmary, doc?"

"No, no," Dinh said as Johnson shoved his offered hand away and scrambled to his feet, wiping the blood from his mouth onto the shoulder of his lab coat. "I've got him, thanks, I'll just…" he gestured and realized that Johnson was halfway back to the spire wall. He waved off the Marine but got to the transporter too late. Their shared lab was empty, and remembering the blood on the ground, he radioed the infirmary.

Keller answered, "Yes, he is here and I don't know that he needs your help, but we may have several patients soon, McKay just ordered a voluntary quarantine, so if you'd like to walk him back upstairs, I wouldn't mind."

\---:::---

"Christ on a cracker! What were you thinking?"

"I wasn't," Johnson twitched away from Keller and she grabbed his chin and held him firmly to start again. "I wasn't thinking."

"Those lumps of flesh are trained killers, you idiot." Dinh started in again.

"I know that." Johnson shouted, his words slurred by the butterfly tape across his jaw. He continued more quietly, "You think I threw myself into the gravel and rolled around in it? Sonofabitch sat on me."

Zelenka spoke quietly from the open door, "Because you threw a punch at him. At a Marine. An officer, I might add."

Dinh straightened and glanced to the entrance of the infirmary. "Is McKay…?"

Radek said, "Dr. McKay is currently occupied with other things. I convinced him that this was minor and that I would investigate." Johnson mumbled his thanks and Dinh found a sudden interest in the instrument tray. "Unfortunately," Radek continued, "Now I must do so. So tell me, Dr. Johnson, why you choose not to participate in the formal combat training for civilians that Col. Sheppard has offered and yet take it on yourself to brawl on the East Pier?"

"They were pissing in the water."

"Ah," Radek pulled his glass off his nose and cleaned them with his shirt, "And you felt the need to redirect their anger toward you?"

Dinh and Johnson shared a confused look. Keller said quietly, "Not pissed off. Urinating."

"This is why I don't try to have these talks with McKay, you know." Radek settled his glasses back on his nose and watched with serene patience as Johnson fidgeted. "Now, unless you plan to be used as a boxing glove in the barracks as well for the military's crimes against laundry and hygiene there, perhaps you could explain why suddenly this is important enough to waste medical supplies."

"The brine shrimp."

Zelenka blinked. Dinh asked, "The generation cycle experiment? I thought we closed that."

"It ran the course, yeah, but," Johnson looked up quickly at both Zelenka and Keller, but spoke to his hands. "We pulled a breeding set of brine shrimp when we first arrived in Atlantis. No, I didn't do anything so stupid as to name them; I'm a scientist. But the starlight patterning and the inertia testing, all that came from my breeding stock. When we left the planet, I lost two tanks and the only reason that the third survived was that it was on me. I sat flat on my ass on the floor with that tank in my arms as we flew through space, hit atmo, splashed down. I pulled glass out of my butt for a day, but I kept one tank running. Didn't lose a specimen in it."

Dinh anticipated the rest, "Ericson's memo."

"...And then Ericson spouts off about contaminating the ecosystem and how all non-indigenous lifeforms must not be allowed to invade this new planet…"

"He's right," Dinh murmured.

"I _know_ he's right! I get it. Cross-contamination of species and god knows we drag shit through the gate all the time but I know he's right, we cannot introduce new species and I did it. I cleaned them, used the microwave to kill all the specimens, I _sterilized_ all of it and then I looked up and those sons of bitches were flinging peach pits into the water and ..." he stopped, his hand flying to his cheek where he'd pulled the bandage free in his anger. Keller stepped forward, batted his hand away, and reset the adhesive.

Radek thumbed his radio. "No, Rodney, we do not have a situation. What are you babbling about now?" Johnson and Dinh shared a significant look, then Radek said, "Yes, I did use babble very deliberately, for…" Keller had Johnson initial his incident form and was closing the file before Radek spoke again, "Good, now that you've spent such time explaining what you do not mean to say, we can go on to what you do mean to say? What situation?" He looked sharply up at Johnson, then shook his head and continued, "Ah, yes, about that unprovoked attack… no, we do not…yes, I…good very good, you do that._Nechte mě být_." He ran his fingers through his hair and turned to face Keller. "It seems that the medical situations in Atlantis have impressed upon our military contingent a certain wariness as regards to …" He glanced at Johnson, "unexpected behavior from our compatriots. You are receiving another patient. It seems one of our Marines has scraped his knuckles."

Johnson used his thumb to see how loose the teeth on the left side were. "Yeah, well, I did some damage."

"Don't be a moron," Dinh started, "by the time I got out there you were bleeding from three places and had gravel up your nose."

"And if I cannot explain to Rodney that there is no emergency and no mysterious Ancient or Alien virus that is making his biologists homicidal without provocation, he will do more damage to you than Lt. Swinton."

Johnson looked up and said, "I'm not homicidal."

"More like suicidal, I'd say," Dinh offered. "Come on. We've got sims to run."

The next day, Keller forwarded Ericson's memo to Sheppard, cc:'ing Zelenka, Johnson and Dinh himself, asking Sheppard to explain to the rank-and-file why planting peaches on an alien planet was a bad idea, with a reference to the incident on MX349-789 and no mention whatsoever of Johnson's experiment.

Dinh figured that was probably for the best.

 

comments and feedback, as always, much appreciated. Beta and encouragement by [](http://beadslut.livejournal.com/profile)[**beadslut**](http://beadslut.livejournal.com/) Working title: Johnson and the Peach Pits, which, as Dave Barry would say, would be an _awesome_ name for a garage band.

**Author's Note:**

> Working title: Johnson and the Peach Pits, which, as Dave Barry would say, would be an _awesome_ name for a garage band.


End file.
